Flip chip technology for manufacturing electronic devices is well known in prior art. Here an integrated circuit, which is also referred to as a chip, is mounted on a substrate such that connecting bumps of the integrated circuit electrically contact contacts of the substrate. In order to accomplish contact between the bumps and the substrate contacts, the integrated circuit is pressed against the substrate and heated such that the bumps partly penetrate the substrate contacts and an adhesive between the substrate and the integrated circuit cures. The tool used for pressing the integrated circuit to the substrate and applying heat is usually referred to as a thermode.
Since the parameters of the mounting process, e.g. heat, pressure, the properties of the integrated circuits, the substrate, the adhesive, etc. vary, the distance between the substrate and the integrated circuit is relatively hard to control. Because several integrated circuits are normally mounted simultaneously on their substrates utilizing a plurality of thermodes, controlling said distance (for all integrated circuits) is even more problematic. Moreover, usually a thin layer of paper for avoiding contamination of the thermodes by the adhesive is fed between the thermodes and the integrated circuits. Unfortunately, this paper also influences the manufacturing process in a way, which is hard to predict.